30 October 2011

According to Kuyper, Christ declares, 'Every square
inch is mine'......our job is to make this a reality.

The reality of life in a fallen world...accepting that
some things won't ever be perfect and that some questions don't have good solutions.....is
not acceptable. Every cultural question must have an answer and everything is
now cast in strict moral categories. Pragmatism is not allowed. Everything is
ideological and since so many of these areas of culture are shaped by law and
power...everything ultimately becomes political.

Interestingly Marxists have understood this principle
as well...they just have a different solution, but they frame it in very
similar ways.

Medieval Manichaeism and the various Gnostic camps
usually understood the universe to be subject to competing principles...a good
force and a bad force...good gods and bad gods.

Thus they were labeled as dualists, rejecting the
monistic structure of the universe and the basis of this structure's
application to society....a unified society...a sacral monism. Since they
didn't believe in a Monistic universe they didn't believe in a state that tried
to create a Monistic socio-political structure based off that understanding of
the universe. In fact to the Manichaeans the very idea of building a 'fleshly'
empire was anathema.

Later when other groups like the Waldensians arose who
questioned the Medieval order in the West and rejected the Monistic structure
under the Papacy they were called Manichaeans...dualists. They understood the
Kingdom in terms in which it could not be manifest on the earth and ruled over
by a political sovereign. So they were not only theological heretics, but a
political danger....they were questioning the social and cultural status
quo.

Consequently you'll find that any time someone came
along who questioned the social order they often get pegged as being
Manichaean. They may have had literally nothing in common with the original
Gnostic groups but because they suggest a dual-order to the world...a spiritual
kingdom...a rejection of a Temporal pre-eschatological Monistic order in which
heaven is trying to be created on earth...they would receive this label. This
has led to a lot of confusion for historians trying to sift out what
individuals actually believed. They maintained the necessity of social
pluralism but did not embrace a Manichaean cosmology. The only Monism that can
appear before the Eschatological Kingdom… is that of the Beast Powers.

To be labeled Manichaean or Dualist was the ultimate
insult and social rejection. You are the other, not one of us, a danger, a
heretic, a traitor.

Sacralists still use it today. Modern Secularists are
arguing for a dualistic or to use the sociological parallel, Pluralistic
society.

It works for awhile, but since no socio-political order
is static in a fallen world, it eventually will succumb to Sacralist (even
Secularism can be Sacralist) desires.

Biblical Christianity wants this antithesis, desires
this social dualism. In fact we ought to insist on it. This is why all the
dissenters from both the Protestant and Roman Catholic Sacralist societies were
driven to flee to the New World, especially to colonies like Pennsylvania. This played a
large role in the psyche of the common people and helped shape some of the
ideas and thought that led many Colonial Christians to support the American
Revolution, even though I would argue its architects were motivated by a very
different ideology. They too were pushing for Pluralism, but for different
reasons and with different goals. Groups like the Moravians and Quakers held to
a theologically principled social Pluralism, while the Founders rooted their
Pluralism in the Enlightenment theories of men like John Locke. Propagandists
like David Barton dispute this and make their case by tolerating a very watered
down Deistic Christianity for the founders, ironically something they would
never allow within in their own Churches. But when it comes to mythmaking,
heroes are given a great deal of leeway.

Today those pushing for Social Dualism or Pluralism are
not called Manichaeans by the guardians, the Conservators of the social order.
A Catholic wanted a Universal or Unified social order. They wanted to preserve
the Medieval order. A Manichaean wanted to divide it.

Thus to reiterate, Manichaean was the ultimate venomous
name-calling charge in the Middle Ages...one who rebels against and undermines
the social order.

Today, all the same baggage and packaged concepts are
applied to the term...Liberal.

Whether or not the person really is on the political
Left, the name is employed to immediately cast aspersions on motive and
character.Once someone is labeled by a
Conservative as a Liberal... you can be assured they're the enemy, they're
wrong.

Even though I'm arguing for some of the most
conservative theological viewpoints, even though I homeschool my children, my
wife doesn't work, and so forth...I'm a liberal because I'm not a
Christo-American Nationalist.

What they're saying is that I'm a Manichaean because I
reject their understanding of the social order. In discussions and on internet
forums...I'm a liberal, thus the discussion is over. You can dismiss everything
I say.

Never mind the fact that the term, just like Manichaean
in the Middle Ages is almost meaningless in the broad way it is used.

It’s kind of like the label Christian. What does that
mean in today's context? For most I would argue it is a sociological label and
has little or nothing to do with any theological understanding. Sacralists
blame liberalism for this watering down of Christendom. I blame them more than
anyone for creating an unbiblical category and understanding of Christian. They
substituted nation and society for Kingdom and when the fallen and lost
people...act fallen and lost...suddenly they're surprised?

While we in no way suggest the universe is ruled by two
forces or gods, we do strongly posit the Scriptures present a certain dualism...the
antithesis between the believer and unbeliever, the kingdoms of this world vs.
the Kingdom of Jesus Christ.

But with Kuyper's seemingly innocuous
statement.....that dualism, that tension will be or ought to be eradicated. All
dualism are invalid. This is practically a mantra for the Kuyperian and many
theologians.

Again, after the 2nd Coming, the antithesis
will no longer exist, but they're trying to labour to bring about this change
right now. This is the Church's task, not merely with the Word-based Gospel,
but with the gospel of politics, economics, arts and sciences. In fact many believe
there is a continuity between this age and the age to come. They believe their
advances and contributions in the arts and sciences will continue on and be
part of the Perfect Realm. Thus we'll have Bach and Baroque music in heaven as
well as Romanesque architecture, not to mention the artwork of the Dutch
Masters.

This is an example of hyper-eschatology. They want
Heaven....now. They're not content to suffer here while we at the same time
participate in and are part of the Kingdom of Heaven (a dualism)...but will
only experience its fullness when Christ returns and this world is purged. We
have Heaven now....in Christ, through the Holy Spirit. But we also do not have
it…at all.

They seem to miss this. Or...it's not good enough?

This is fundamentally different understanding of the
nature and mission of the Kingdom of God and our place in the world.

2 comments:

"It’s kind of like the label Christian. What does that mean in today's context? For most I would argue it is a sociological label and has little or nothing to do with any theological understanding."

What are we to do with this fact? Saying, "I am a Christian" means as much as "I have brown hair" or "I am American". It means little to nothing, a little aesthetic descriptor, may (or may not) explain where you are on Sunday mornings and to what relics/buildings/vestments you show reverence for.

It makes my skin crawl that this is what we see, that this is what is claimed in the name of Jesus of Nazareth.

Even today a girl I was working with asked me about why I never went through with joining the USMC and I said "In short, I met Jesus" and I got a "That's cool". Maybe it was out of not knowing what to do with a statement like that; but most likely it was a "Oh you're now a moralist/conservative, that's nice" like I just decided to vote one way over another, not pick up a cross and die to the world.

Do I expect her to understand? No, but the fact that it has a ring of normalcy is odd. Like Kierkegaard had said about his own kin, for one of them to become Christian they must unlearn all the mythos, all the christendom, and then become Christian. The heathen is in a better place than the 'chritendomite'. What is Jesus but a statue, a teacher of morality, a bobblehead. Not the Living Word who cuts off all our false exterior, and says "Follow Me".

Now sometimes I just think I should refer to myself as a follower/disciple of Christ Jesus. It has lost its sacralist, religioso baggage. It almost sounds radical. I almost think the Apostles would approve, they adopting a name of ridicule launched at them. In the metal scene, certain artists who've been reborn are ridiculed as being "christ-fairies". I'd rather introduce myself as that than the bland 'Christian'.

Cal, I do not use the term "Christian" anymore, because it has become so debauched. It no longer conveys the understanding that a person has been born again, rejected the old life, died to self and to the world to live by His Spirit, called out ones--in other words--that a radical spiritual reality delivering one from the kingdom of darkness to the kingdom of light has taken place in an individual.

I say "disciple of Jesus" or "follower of Jesus" to refer to a person who has obeyed the gospel.

It is really disturbing and scarey that some very nice and sweet people who have gone to church all their lives and sing hymns with great true theology in them, have no understanding of what a disciple is, or how to obey the gospel, or that they need to have an actual change of nature by the power of the Living God. The reverends are not telling them. The reverends give humanistic moral pep talks about making a difference and doing your best, which I see as phariseeism: powerless and deceiving cultural religion.

I was taught at the beginning of my regenerated life, to use exclusively biblical terms for biblical concepts. (Wise, I contend, but oh boy this can get you in lots of trouble with self-appointed gatekeepers of the faith, especially “confession-signers”!) "Christian" isn't a biblical term for regenerated ekklesia; remember it was merely what unsaved observers called disciples in Antioch. I don't see any reason why we should feel we need to keep using the word if it is not useful anymore.